By Rafe Calder
Görlitz is in Saxony, on the Lusatian Neisse River, directly opposite the Polish town of Zgorzelec. Wikipedia calls it the largest town in Upper Lusatia and the easternmost town in Germany. Together with Zgorzelec, it forms what the same article calls the Euro City, with about 86,000 combined inhabitants.
How the town got here
The date of founding is unknown. Wikipedia says Görlitz was first mentioned in a document of 1071 under Henry IV, which granted it to the Diocese of Meissen, and that the village gradually became a town in the thirteenth century. It developed on the Via Regia trade route and prospered through the cloth trade. In 1346 it joined the Lusatian League.
The list of owners is long. Wikipedia says that in 1319 it was part of the Duchy of Jawor, and in 1329 it returned to Bohemia. In 1547 it lost important privileges. In 1635, after the Thirty Years’ War, it was ceded to the Electorate of Saxony, and in 1815, after the Congress of Vienna, it passed to Prussia.
The line through the middle
In 1945 the Oder–Neisse line split the town, and the right bank became Zgorzelec in Poland. Wikipedia says that in 1952 Görlitz became part of the Dresden District in the GDR, that visa-free travel to Poland opened in 1972 and that East Germany closed the border in 1980. The Altstadtbrücke opened on 20 October 2004, and border controls ended on 20 December 2007, when Poland joined Schengen.
Why the old town is still there
Görlitz was spared major destruction in the Second World War, according to Wikipedia, although German troops destroyed all the bridges over the Neisse near the war’s end. The Visit Saxony tourism site, which is promotional, says the town has nearly 4,000 historical buildings and describes the cityscape as well preserved compared with other towns in Central Europe. It says an anonymous donor supported the city for more than twenty years, which led to the founding of the Altstadtstiftung, a foundation responsible for preserving historic buildings. We give no figure. Wikipedia says more than 700 buildings had been renovated as of 2013.
The town’s Nazi-era history is not covered on this page. It deserves a sourced piece of its own, and we do not want to give it a single line.
What to look at
Wikipedia names the Lower Market Square (Untermarkt) and Upper Market Square (Obermarkt) as the heart of the old town, and the churches of St Peter and St Paul and of the Holy Trinity as landmarks. It says the Schönhof is one of the oldest civic Renaissance buildings in Germany. Visit Saxony is more specific and more promotional: it says the Schönhof was built in 1526, calls it the oldest civic Renaissance house in Germany, and says it now houses the Silesian Museum. The two sources differ in how strongly they put it, and we give both.
The Peterskirche contains the Sun Organ. Visit Saxony says it was built by Eugenio Casparini in the seventeenth century and can imitate sounds such as birdsong. A music-travel page, bach-cantatas.com, says it was built by Eugenio and Adam Horatio Casparini between 1697 and 1703, and that a fire in 1691 destroyed the church’s Gothic interior, including two organs, before it was redecorated in Baroque style. The page also says Bach’s presence in the town is inferred rather than documented.
A model of the Holy Sepulchre was begun in 1465, according to Wikipedia. The music page says only that it was built in the late fifteenth century.
The film set
Wikipedia says The Grand Budapest Hotel used Görlitz as its main location, with a vacant department store serving as the hotel, and that Inglourious Basterds used the Lower and Upper Market Squares. It also lists The Book Thief and part of The Reader. Visit Saxony does not mention films. We keep the film list as Wikipedia’s.
A sourced maker
None. We have no sourced maker or workshop in Görlitz to point to, and we would rather say so than invent one. Sephari starts with the place. The makers come when we can name them honestly.
What we left out
Population figures, opening times, tour routes, and the Nazi-era detail noted above.
Roam first. Shop later.